We've Seen This From Shia LaBeouf Before

On Sunday, the documentary Slauson Rec debuted at the Cannes Film Festival. Filmed by first-time director Leo Lewis O’Neil from 2018 to 2020, it chronicles the experimental theater company in Los Angeles that Shia LaBeouf tried (and failed) to get off the ground during that time period. More importantly, it documents some pretty horrific behavior from LaBeouf.

The film shows the actor screaming, throwing chairs and generally losing his shit during rehearsals for a pandemic-era drive-through play, per Variety. LaBeouf spends much of the two-and-a-half-hour doc both verbally and physically abusing his students; at one point, he gets into a fistfight with a 22-year-old aspiring actor who quits the show for a role on a Netflix series, and in another scene he pins someone up against a wall by pressing his forearm to their throat. According to the Variety report, roughly 30 people walked out of the Cannes screening, presumably because those scenes of LaBeouf terrorizing his acting class were too upsetting to sit through.

What makes Slauson Rec fascinating, however, is that it has LaBeouf’s full support, despite how terrible it makes him look. The 38-year-old has been at Cannes promoting the movie, and on Sunday, The Hollywood Reporter published an exclusive, lengthy interview with him about the doc. LaBeouf spends most of the interview reiterating that he takes full accountability for his actions and emphasizing that he’s a changed man. Below, some of the most self-flagellating soundbites from the piece. (You can read the full article here.)

“When this thing comes out, it isn’t any worse than what’s been said about me previously. Maybe it reifies people’s ideas about me. I think, at heart, I’m a good guy. Am I fucked up? Yes. Is my process ugly and disgusting? Yes. Have I done horrible shit in the past that I’m going to have to make amends for the rest of my life? Yes. Does this movie change any of that? No. Does it also allow my people to get a foot into this fucking industry? Yes. So gas pedal down, green light go.”
“I don’t think I’m unique or special. I don’t think I’m the first in my line of work or any creative craft to lose the plot a bit. Leo documented it in a loving way, but full-blown — I turned into an animal.”
“There’s unacceptable shit in there. There’s beautiful shit in there. What this won’t be is a lack of accountability. This won’t be me saying, ‘I did this because of that.’ None of that type of shit.”
“That stemmed from a whole bunch of dysfunctional behavior, which I’m not proud of but I’m happy it’s documented. Yes, that’s true. Yes, I look like a fucking asshole. Yes, my boy got into Cannes. I can be both disgusted with myself and happy as fuck for my guy. I can be both things.”
“I’m not going to excuse none of it. Don’t print this or we’ll redo the interview if it comes across that way. I have to own all of my shit and I do. I own all of it. No excuses. The behavior: Abhorrent. No excuses. No explanation.”
“I’m in a program. I’ve got to own my side and I’ve also got to make it right. Me going to Cannes, being a support system, it’s all part of my process.”

On the surface, LaBeouf is saying all the right things. It’s extremely rare for a celebrity accused of this type of behavior (and, in this case, who has been filmed doing it) to fully admit wrongdoing without offering up any kind of excuse or issuing some sort of vague statement that was clearly crafted by a crisis PR team. His desire to “make it right” by supporting the very film that showcases some of his worst behavior — while maybe not admirable per se — has to count for something, right?

The problem is that we’ve heard all this from him before. “I’ve got to look at my failures in the face for a while,” LaBeouf said in a 2018 Esquire cover story about his contrition in the wake of a drunken tirade during his 2017 arrest in Savannah, Georgia. “I need to take ownership of my shit and clean up my side of the street a bit before I can go out there and work again, so I’m trying to stay creative and learn from my mistakes.”

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The misconduct in Slauson Rec takes place primarily in 2020, two years after he spoke about learning from his mistakes. The accountability he attempts to take in that Esquire profile also came just a few months before he started dating FKA Twigs, who filed a lawsuit against him in 2021 on the grounds of “sexual battery, battery, assault, intentional infliction of emotional distress and gross negligence” during their relationship. On an appearance on Jon Bernthal’s podcast Real Ones in 2022, LaBeouf admitted he was abusive and once again owned up to his mistakes. “I hurt that woman,” he said. “And in the process of doing that, I hurt many other people, and many other people before that woman. I was a pleasure-seeking, selfish, self-centered, dishonest, inconsiderate, fearful human being. When I think about what my life has become, and what it is now, like what my purpose is now… I need to be useful. And when I look at this #MeToo environment, there’s not a whole lot of dudes that are taking accountability.”

“I fucked up bad,” he continued. “Like crash and burn type shit. [I] hurt a lot of people, and I’m fully aware of that. And I’m going to owe for the rest of my life.”

It’s great that LaBeouf recognizes his failures and acknowledges the harm he’s caused; it’s certainly more of an apology than what we’ve seen from many other men in Hollywood who have been called out for their transgressions. It’s also worth reiterating that what’s captured in Slauson Rec happened nearly five years ago, certainly enough time for someone to do the work — as LaBeouf says, he’s “in a program” — and change their ways. It’s hard not to feel like LaBeouf is caught in an endless loop of bad behavior and apologies: Do something unacceptable. Take accountability publicly. Rinse and repeat.

Progress isn’t always linear, of course, and a step backward or two on a journey toward personal growth is inevitable (though no less frustrating). But when it becomes a pattern like it has with LaBeouf, eventually we have to question his sincerity. Is this latest attempt to prove he’s a changed man perhaps related to the fact that his trial date for the FKA Twigs lawsuit is currently set for September 29 of this year? Is he really sorry, or is he simply acting? Admissions of guilt and apologies are great, but they’re not a get-out-of-jail-free card.